Brooklyn is but one of the five boroughs of New York City, with a population of 2.5 million. Brooklyn was an independent city with a rich history of its own that became part of New York City in 1898.
It is a borough filled with the energy of diverse groups, with many neighborhoods offering authentic ethnic cuisines. While Brooklyn is one of the most densely populated areas in the United States, there are far more private homes than apartment buildings.
The Heart of Brooklyn area is a traditional example of using urban space on a grand scale, and includes the Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn Botanic Garden and Prospect Park, which was designed by the same landscape architect who designed Manhattan‘s Central Park.
Brooklyn is undergoing a renaissance, with a major new park, a sports and entertainment center and museums — not to mention fertile areas for business development. Many arts groups have found Brooklyn a congenial home, partly because real estate is much more reasonable than in Manhattan.
Yes, when people think of New York City, they‘re mostly thinking of Manhattan. A visit to Brooklyn will change that. Brooklyn has its own powerful allure, and no single trip can explore all of it. Royal Luxury Limousines encourage you to take a road trip through Brooklyn, making many stops along the way. Just a few attraction listed below will fill your trip with many things to see, learn, and do while in Brooklyn.
Brooklyn Bridge Park
Offering an iconic view of lower Manhattan across the East River, Brooklyn Bridge Park first opened in 2010 on a site with historic resonance to the Revolutionary War.
The park‘s 85 acres include play areas for children, sports fields, a picnic peninsula for fresh-cooked meals and fishing and boating.
Jane‘s Carousel in the Fulton Ferry part of the park is a restored 1922 carousel with 48 horses and three chariots. It was the first carousel to be placed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Building 92, Brooklyn Navy Yard
The newest Brooklyn museum is Building 92 at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. The yard was established in 1801 as one of the nation‘s first five shipyards and during World War II employed 70,000 people. It was decommissioned in 1966.
After decades of neglect, the yard has acquired new life as an industrial park that is home to many small businesses. The museum offers tours of yard facilities which have been preserved. The second floor is the resource center, which houses photographs and artifacts.
Brooklyn Museum
Housed in a 560,000-square-foot, Beaux-Arts building, the Brooklyn Museum is one of the largest in the country. With roots back to the early 19th century, most of the museum‘s 1.5 million pieces were acquired in the early 20th century.
Although only a fraction of its total holdings are on view at any time, its commitment to Western and non-Western art is reflected in exhibitions of American, European, African, Asian, Islamic and Ancient Egyptian culture.
The museum offers daily guided tours and audio tours.
Brooklyn Botanic Garden
Founded in 1910, the Brooklyn Botanic Garden occupies 52 acres, with many specialty gardens and pavilions that are visited by 900,000 people annually.
The Japanese Hill and Pond Garden was constructed in 1915, renovated in 2000, and is the oldest of its kind in an American museum.
The Cranford Rose Garden is home to 1,400 kinds of roses, while the Shakespeare Garden has more than 80 plants mentioned in the Bard‘s plays. It was a gift from Henry Folger, who founded the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington.
Other gardens are designed for children and arranged by plant families to show their evolution. There are also three-climate controlled pavilions for tropical, warm weather and desert plants.
Brooklyn Academy of Music
A multiarts center, the Brooklyn Academy of Music dates to the mid-19th century and includes an opera house, a smaller theater, and movie theater and rehearsal space.
The academy became an important center for innovative performance arts — music, dance and theater — during the tenure of executive director Harvey Lichtenstein (1967-99). Upcoming productions include operas by New York City Opera, French baroque opera conducted by William Christie, the Royal Ballet of Cambodia and Dance Africa, jazz concerts, visual arts and talks.
Barclays Center
A multipurpose sports and entertainment arena, the Barclays Center opened in September with a concert by Jay-Z and is home to the Brooklyn Nets NBA team.
The indoor arena is the first built in New York City since 1969 and cost $1 billion. It was designed for basketball, seats more than 17,000 and offers a close connection to the action.